Ahead of talks aimed at setting new powers for the International Atomic Energy Agency, or IAEA, to detect clandestine nuclear activities, John B. Ritch 3d, U.S. ambassador to United Nations organizations in Vienna, talked with Joseph Fitchett of the International Herald Tribune about the Clinton administration's view of the controversial reform.

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Q. What is the purpose of trying to beef up the UN watchdog that missed Iraq's nuclear program?

A. Until the Iraq war the IAEA performed impeccably but with sharply limited powers. The agency focused solely on preventing illicit diversion of bomb-grade materials from what we call declared nuclear facilities, meaning those that governments had listed with the agency. Everyone assumed that any secret bomb would use plutonium or highly enriched uranium from a power plant or a research facility that was known about.

Figuratively, people worried about a crafty heist that lifted a small but deadly quantity of fissile material from beneath the agency's seals and monitoring cameras. Saddam Hussein proved this assumption false by operating declared civilian activities under effective safeguards while pursuing a secret weapons program in parallel. Some of his clandestine facilities were within eyesight of declared sites, but IAEA inspectors had no authority even to walk over and take a look.

It's not that they were duped; their mandate was simply too narrow. So Saddam was a lesson not just for the IAEA but for the world community.

A. This is an enormous step — advancing from supervision of several hundred known facilities to a system that gives a complete picture of everything a country is doing that might conceivably be related to a secret bomb project.

It's a major challenge conceptually, technologically and politically. But it offers a commensurate payoff. Confidence that secret nuclear activity is not occurring anywhere yields greater security and is also, obviously, a precondition for further nuclear disarmament.

Q. What guarantee is there that this system would be credible?

A. The IAEA plan depends on the fact that nuclear activity inevitably leaves telltale traces — paper trails and minute but detectable isotopes that reveal a nuclear process. Countries will present more information about their activities that are potentially nuclear-related.

And the IAEA will go more places. It will also use new, highly sophisticated sensing technologies that can analyze infinitesimal molecules in samples from air, in water or in a plant leaf. An example: Harmless microscopic dust on the clothing of hostages held by Saddam Hussein was our first evidence of his nuclear weapons program.

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A. What remains is political. We must finalize the agreement — and we're already close — that commits countries to cooperate with this more intrusive regime of inspections. Once this is done, presumably by December, countries will either sign and participate, or they will refuse and thus invite intense world suspicion.

Ironically, the most resistant governments are not states that anybody suspects of bad nuclear intentions. They're nations, including Germany and Japan, that could have nuclear weapons but don't want to — but do have large civilian nuclear businesses.

The simple truth is that their nuclear industries fear the inconvenience. So they have revived two bogeymen we first heard about 25 years ago when safeguards were invented. One is that inspections will give away industrial secrets. The other is that some countries will be penalized with unfair costs in complying. There is not a shred of evidence for either objection.

Q. Aren't Germany and Japan objecting to what they see as a double standard that imposes inspections on their industries but disregards the same industries in the nuclear weapons states — the United States, Britain, China, France and Russia?

A. It is true that these five countries are treated differently precisely because they already have the bomb and can't be suspected of developing one secretly. But we recognize that these countries have special responsibilities. That's why the United States has promised to accept the IAEA's proposed new reporting requirements on all U.S. commercial activities that could contribute to another country's nuclear program.

We will also submit to all relevant domestic inspections. President Clinton is quite clear that the minor costs and intrusions pale against the imperative of preventing another Saddam. He sees this program as a bulwark against proliferation and that is why he is committed to making it happen.